It is customary for food processors to vacuum package bulky food articles such as whole muscle meat products, brick cheese and poultry in shrink bags. The processor loads the food article into the bag and evacuates the bag to collapse it about the food product. The bag is sealed while in its evacuated condition by gathering the open end and applying a metal clip or by heat sealing. The sealed bag then is passed through a hot water bath or hot air tunnel to shrink the sealed bag about the food product. Shrinking the bag in this fashion closely conforms the bag to the contour of the food product thereby making an attractive, generally wrinkle-free package.
Poultry items such as turkeys and other whole birds present several problems for this type of packaging. For example, the poultry carcass is generally the shape of a tear drop having a broad rounded breast portion tapering to the tail of the bird. The tear drop shape is accentuated by the customary practice of folding the legs of the bird close to the body and binding the end of the legs to the tail of the bird. This tear drop shape does not lend itself to formation of a substantially wrinkle free package even when using shrink film.
A bag fabricated to accommodate a whole bird, generally has front and rear panels composed of a heat shrinkable plastic film which are heat sealed together at the closed end of the bag. It is common to have the closed end of the bag convex to accommodate the broad rounded breast of the bird. The opposite open end of the bag must be wide enough to receive the bird which is inserted breast first into the bag. If the wide bag opening is stretched to a flat width and heat sealed straight across the bag, a considerable amount of unfilled bag material remains extended across the tail of the bird. On heat shrinking, only a portion of this material conforms to the tapered contour of the bird whereas the remainder forms an unattractive flange which increases in width towards the tail of the bird.
One approach for avoiding the formation of this flange is to gather the open end of the bag about the tail of the bird and close the gathered opening with a metal clip. This procedure pulls the bag close to and along the more tapered parts of the bird. Heat shrinking the pulled and gathered bag material generates creases and folds which radiate out from under the clip for some distance along the body of the bird. While this generally provides a more asthethically pleasing appearance than the flange caused by heat sealing, these creases and folds often truncate any design or identification printed on the bag and are objectionable. Accordingly, an even smoother, crease and fold-free appearance with the bag stretched taut over the legs and tail of the bird is preferred.
Another problem related to packaging turkeys and the like in shrink bags is that the resulting packaged product is bulky, relatively heavy, usually frozen, and difficult to manually grasp and lift. Therefore it is desirable to provide a carrying handle to facilitate handling the vacuum packaged product. For this purpose a separate handle is attached to the packaged product at the clip closure or the product is inserted into a netting which is gathered and clipped to provide a carrying handle. Both arrangements add to the packaging costs.
Preferably, the handle should be formed integral with the bag to avoid the added expense and processing steps of attaching a handle to the packaged product. For poultry packaging, a handle located at the tail of the bird is preferred as this leaves the package over the breast area of the bird free to receive printed information such as a decorative design, corporate logo or other identifying product information. Also, a handle at the tail of the bird provides a desirable weight distribution in that the heavier breast portion of the bird is carried below the lighter tail portion.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,555,025 discloses a shrink bag having an integral handle forming portion. The bag is a so called "extended lip bag" wherein one bag panel extends beyond the bag open end. As disclosed in this patent, the handle is formed in the extended lip portion by punching a hot die through the lip to provide an opening having a fused bead extending continuously about the opening. Formation of the opening in the lip is essential because inserting the hot die through the bag at any other location will fuse the bag panels together thereby partly occluding the bag. Upon heat shrinking, the extended lip thickens and forms a handle which protrudes longitudinally from the resulting package.
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide a shrink bag having an integral handle.
Another object is to provide a shrink bag having an integral handle positioned so as not to occlude any portion of the bag opening.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a shrink bag with an integral carrying handle wherein the bag is especially adapted for packaging whole body poultry such as turkeys and the like.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a shrink bag having an integral handle portion located at the end of the bag opposite its open end.
A still further object is to provide a shrink bag having an integral handle which lies close to the surface of the resulting package.